Happy Hour Harmonica Podcast

Antonio Serrano interview

• Neil Warren • Season 1 • Episode 23

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Chromatic player, Antonio Serrano, is the current SPAH harmonica player of the year. And with good reason.
Antonio’s father was a great influence on the fledgling harmonica player. And Antonio met Larry Adler at a young age, and performed with him for the first time, at only 13 years of old. Since that time Antonio has made a big splash on the Spanish music scene, not least when he played with flamenco legend Paco de Lucia. He has recorded with many artists and released some albums under his own name, including a tribute to the legendary Toots Thielemans, who he has also performed with.

Select the Chapter Markers tab above to select different sections of the podcast (website version only).

Links:
https://kamalaproducciones.com/portfolio_page/antonio-serrano

YouTube:
Performing with Larry Adler at age 13:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qAamKnAvnNs&feature=youtu.be

Performing with Toots Thielemans:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UdoL5SwLqTU&feature=youtu.be

Playing with Paco de Lucia: (Flamenco)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PT8-3_fqO4Y&app=desktop

Playing I Feel For You with Chaka Khan:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SbLY9QdYADw&feature=youtu.be

Antonio playing Rhapsody In Blue:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gRulfholtfQ&feature=youtu.be

Antonio playing Send In The Clowns from his first album:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FM7-xZ4RPkc

SPAH seminar:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-HOZHIqW5TI&feature=youtu.be&t=14145&fbclid=IwAR0ZdDoToh7yyIqcSQj9oKKATzkuCxfX9Bpusr3mLeMKF311R4FLxUA_OrI


Podcast website:
https://www.harmonicahappyhour.com

Donations:
If you want to make a voluntary donation to help support the running costs of the podcast then please use this link (or visit the podcast website link above):
https://paypal.me/harmonicahappyhour?locale.x=en_GB

Spotify Playlist:
Also check out the Spotify Playlist, which contains most of the songs discussed in the podcast:
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/5QC6RF2VTfs4iPuasJBqwT?si=M-j3IkiISeefhR7ybm9qIQ

Podcast sponsors:
This podcast is sponsored by SEYDEL harmonicas - visit the oldest harmonica factory in the world at www.seydel1847.com  or on Facebook or Instagram at SEYDEL HARMONICAS
and Blows Me Away Productions: http://www.blowsmeaway.com/

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SPEAKER_02:

Chromatic player Antonio Serrano joins me for episode 23 of the podcast. Antonio is the current Spa Harmonica Player of the Year, and with good reason. Antonio's father was a great influence on the fledgling harmonica player, and Antonio met Larry Adler at a young age and performed with him for the first time at only 13 years old. Since that time, Antonio has made a big splash on the Spanish music scene, not least when he played with flamenco legend Paco de Lucia. He has recorded with many artists and recorded some albums under his own name, including a tribute to the legendary Toots Teelmans, who he has also performed with. A word to my sponsor again, thanks to the Lone Wolf Blues Company, makers of effects pedals, microphones and more, designed for harmonica. Remember, when you want control over your tone, you want Lone Wolf. Hello Antonio Serrano and welcome to the podcast. Hi Neil. Thanks very much for joining me today. You live in

SPEAKER_01:

Madrid normally, don't you? I've lived in Madrid for a long time and a few months ago I moved to Altea, a small town in the east coast of Spain. It's a beautiful place and all my family lives here, like my mother, my brother, my sister. I lived here for almost 10 years when I was a kid and it's like our town.

SPEAKER_02:

Okay, so the town you're in now is the town you grew up in and learned to start playing harmonica then?

SPEAKER_01:

Not exactly because I was born in Madrid and I started playing when I was very, very young, like five, six years old. So I started when I lived in Madrid. When I was 11 was that we moved here. So I already played a little bit when we moved here. But I mean, here I started to meet musicians. It's a small town. When you live in a big city, you just meet the people that you have around, you know, when you're in school or when you go to conservatory. But here, it's a small town and there's a lot of musicians. There's a small music school. They have a band, like a brass band, and everybody, you know, all the kids from town just... They play there and they have an experience when they're young. So I also played there and I had a very natural musical experience in this town. It happens in all the east coast of Spain. There's a lot of tradition that everybody should go to the music school and learn a wind instrument like a trumpet or clarinet. They rehearsal once or twice a week. It's a nice thing.

SPEAKER_02:

I believe your father was very influential in your early playing as well. He played harmonica then, didn't he? That's why he wanted you to pick it up.

SPEAKER_01:

Yes, absolutely. He was really, really passionate for the harmonica. also for the music. But I mean, he had a special love for the harmonica. So it was the first instrument that I actually met, you know, and started playing. And he also loved to teach. I mean, he was a very good teacher. He tried to make it interesting and joyful for us. We were very young. I say us because my brother and sister also learned when we were young. And he tried to make it interesting and very exciting to learn music and to learn how to play the harmonica. And even from the beginning, he tried to teach us not only how to play the instrument or how to play songs, but also to learn simultaneously to read music and write music. He really believed in learning music in a complete way, not only as a performer or just for a hobby, but try to read to learn things well. Like if you want to play music, try to learn how to read music. And also, he also taught us how to improvise, although he He wasn't like a jazz musician himself. He didn't really know much about harmony, but he liked improvisation, like free improvisation. In the lessons, in the classes we had, we practiced improvisation in a free conversational way, let's say, you know, like we kind of gathered on a circle, you know, like the different harmonica players in the class and one had to play something and the other one had to answer him and then the other one had to answer the previous one. It was like a musical conversation, let's say, you know. So I was very lucky actually to and it was definitely really important the father I had you know to become a harmonica player a professional musician with the harmonica

SPEAKER_02:

he taught you in groups was this with your brothers and sisters and other people as well

SPEAKER_01:

yeah the beginning it was only my sister and me in a few weeks time like this is when he started teaching some other people just started to turn up and yeah I remember it was a class we were maybe 10 or 12 my father was quite special and he he renewed Yeah, it sounds like he did

SPEAKER_02:

a great job. And I believe your father had you playing the tremolo first, even for a year or two before you picked up the chromatic.

SPEAKER_01:

That's true. He had a theory about this. He said that when you start, especially if you're a kid and you start on an instrument, you still haven't got a sound of your own. You don't really have a built sound. The tremolo harmonica gives you the opportunity just by playing the tremolo. putting some air in it to get a nice kind of vibrato, well, tremolo sound. You don't have to do anything to get a harmonious sound. So he believed that it was a nice instrument to start with. And he also said that it was a very tough instrument. You had to really blow very hard to break it. So it was good for a beginner. It was also a cheap instrument. So there were several reasons that took him to choose that instrument for beginning. I don't know if I have the same opinion, but it was interesting, actually. Those reasons that he had were reasonable. Yeah. And do you still play a bit of tremolo now? No, not at all. Not at all. I love it. I love instrument I remember in Bristol I heard it's the most beautiful tremolo playing I've ever heard also the way the Asians play is very spectacular you know like changing from one harmonica to the other I play classical pieces and stuff it's interesting but I'm

SPEAKER_02:

very interested in this idea that obviously you've had a A very good upbringing with your father there. About learning when you're young, we all know that you learn things more quickly when you're young. And so to get to the level where you have, obviously you picked up the harmonica initially around the age of seven, yeah? So what is it you think about picking up the harmonica so early? And maybe what does that mean for if people pick it up later in life, where they can get so far?

SPEAKER_01:

Well, I mean, I'm not a neuroscientist, but I'm very curious about how we learn and about knowledge and how knowledge gets into our brains. And what I've read about it is that when we are very young is when we pick up the different languages. There are thousands of languages, not like the language we speak is one of them, but the music is another language and the language of signs, the language of colors, the language of... There are so many languages. that we pick up when we are young just by living. After a certain age, it's difficult to learn a completely new language. There's something in the brain that for some reason doesn't work the same way. When we get older, I don't know, it's not so flexible. If you've had an exposure to music when you're very young, I think it's going to be easier for you to play not only the harmonica but any other instrument. I mean, it's not about the harmonica, I think. I think it's more about understanding the language of music. So the sooner you have an exposure to that language, I think the more fluid you're going to be speaking that language or understanding that language. Some people say, no, I started playing the harmonica when I was 17. Actually, two cinemas, I think, started playing the harmonica pretty late, but... That doesn't mean his exposure to music was that late. I mean, he started playing the accordion, I think, when he was four years old or five. So he was exposed to music very, very soon in his life. So then when he was 17, he decided to pick up the harmonica. It's not really when he started playing music. And some people even think that they started in music when they were older, but you don't really remember what happened to you when you were two, three, four years old. Maybe you had a grandmother that was singing songs to you all the time, or you had somebody that was playing the radio for you all the time, and you probably don't remember. So it's difficult sometimes to really know objectively when you were exposed to the music for the first time. I think it's more about that, about when do you expose yourself to music. So you picked up the chromatic after a couple of years, playing the tremolo. I started playing classical pieces, well, trying

SPEAKER_02:

to play classical pieces on the harmonica. So is that what turned you to the chromatic then, to start playing classical?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. And also, well, to be able to play the slide, you know, there were some pieces that I was trying to play, not only classical pieces, but other songs that needed some, you know, some chromatic notes. So I don't know, I was playing the Entertainer, for example, or I was playing Beer Barrel Polka. I needed some chromatic notes. So that's why I started playing the chromatic harmonica. And also because my reference was my father, and I really enjoyed it. seeing him play a chromatic. So I moved into that. Actually, my father also played the blues harp and the diatonic harmonicas, but without any bendings, without using bendings, just as a very clean, pure sound, you know, with tongue-blocking techniques, like to make accompaniments like this. He used to play like this, like very, very... Very clean. I didn't know about the bending and the blues and that until I was 13 or 14, I think, that I assisted the 1989 world competition in Jersey. I couldn't believe how many different ways there were to play the harmonica.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, and of course, it might surprise some people to hear that you do play some diatonic. So you play some pretty decent blues diatonic as well, don't you?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, for a few years. I really got into that in my teens. I really wanted to understand it. how to play the blues harmonica, I was really impressed by the expressivity and the power of the bendings and those vibratos, those wah-wahs. I don't know. I mean, the diatonic harmonica has a lot of soul behind. There's a lot of things that you can do on it that are so expressive that I really wanted to learn. I mean, I'm not really, really good at it, but I can do... Well, I play my way. I understand the instrument. And if I practiced more, maybe I would play better. But well, for what I need, I'm okay.

SPEAKER_02:

Another thing about your early developments I just wanted to pick up on is that playing in this group you were learning in with your father and your brothers and sisters, you didn't have other instruments. So you learned to start to accompany on the chromatic. Is that right? So you started to learn to play chords and octaves and things, the sport you're playing.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, because we played in the family group, like my brother, my sister and me, you know, we played in bars and even on the street. Yeah, it was a bit boring just to play the melody, you know, so I started learning how to comp with octaves to make the sound bigger and create a kind of accordion effect. At the beginning, I felt dizzy, you know, like really dizzy when I did it because I was using so much air, you know, I... I played for a few songs and I had to sit down. Well, eventually I got used to it, but.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, but I think that that has kind of shaped your sound quite a lot, isn't it? Because you do use octaves a lot when you're playing and you do use chords, maybe more so than some other chromatic players. Is that the thing where you picked it up?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, especially the octaves and the freedom of the tongue, you know, like be able to do whatever you want with the tongue. But it wasn't until I started working on classical pieces written for the harmonica, like like the Villalobos Concerto, that I really started to play like double stops, you know, like two, six, thirds, fifths, changing the embouchure. In that time, I was only using octaves and the tongue comping. When I started learning... That's from the Villa Lovos Concerto. I had to start moving the mouth, open, close, open, close. And also when I met Larry Adler, he taught me a few things that were really beautiful. So I started to practice that kind of thing. I thought it was really, really interesting.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, absolutely. And so, yeah, you mentioned Larry Adler there. So let's get on to Larry now. So did you first meet him when you played with him in Paris when you were 13 years old or had you met him before then?

SPEAKER_01:

Well, I met him a few months before in the Jersey competition, World Championship, the first World Championship in 1987, I think it was. And that's where I met Larry Adler and then he invited me to play with him in Paris. Did you have lessons with him? Well, at the beginning, we just kind of rehearsed. on the phone for the concerts that we did. We did a few concerts. My father wanted me to take some lessons with him, so he came to Spain. Yeah, we spent some time together, but I don't know, there weren't really lessons, you know. I was playing some symphonic concerts. So I was playing pieces that were arranged for him, like Romanian Rhapsody, Rhapsody in Blue. I was playing those pieces. So, I mean, the class is just consistent in me playing the music for him. And he just made a few comments. Well, I think here you should do this. He didn't really teach me in the way other teachers kind of teach. We talked a lot about music. We didn't talk much about the harmonica. I remember he told me, well, I don't have much to tell you about the harmonica. I think you have a very good technique that's the most important thing at the beginning and the only thing he used to say was try to look for your own sound to have your own identity try not to imitate other people because if you want to be an artist and you want to do something in music you got to be yourself and that was the kind of advice he used to tell me more than technical things I had a very good understanding of the instrument there already and I think he could feel that I mean anything I heard I could play more or less I I didn't need really a lot of technical classes. The only thing I felt I needed to practice, I needed really lessons on, was a tongue switch. You know this technique? Yeah, putting it either side of your mouth. Yeah, but Larry Adler didn't really do that. In that time, the person that was really doing that professionally was Robert Bonfiglio. He wanted me to go to Manhattan to study with him. And I was quite interested in doing that. But I don't know, for some reason, my father didn't want me to go. I don't know, but I was really interested because I really wanted to study that technique and learn that technique. Because I think that's, in a way, that's probably the future. of the chromatic harmonica, somebody that can really play that technique fluently and improvise with it and do all kinds of intervals and things that are not so easy or almost impossible to do without that technique. Yeah,

SPEAKER_02:

I think you'd have to start doing it when you're age seven, Antonio. There's a perception about Larry Adler in some quarters, isn't there, that he wasn't a kind of pure musician, that he kind of bust it a little. I mean, looking at the things he achieved, you know, playing big concerts, you know, with big orchestras on one level and then playing, you know, in film store. I've read, you know, his autobiography and a biography about him. And he was definitely a larger than life character, wasn't he? You know, very outspoken and, you know, mature he got what he wanted out of life so is that what he was like as a person as well? I

SPEAKER_01:

think he was a very, very serious musician. I don't know. I mean, I was very young when I met him. And I don't know if I knew enough about music to really understand him. But when I hear his recordings nowadays, I think he was a very serious musician. And the way he understood music, I mean, he could play the piano very well. He could compose. He knew a lot about harmony. He had an amazing ear. And his sound was unique. What he can do on the chromatic harmonica sound It's just unbelievable. I mean, I've never heard anybody be... I think he's definitely the biggest chromatic harmonica player of all times. And not only a harmonica player, but he was an amazing musician. I mean, he could get very serious composers to write music for him. You need the respect of these people to get them to write music for you. It's not just that you're going to pay and they're going to write music for you. These people, they don't only work for money. They work when they really feel they admire somebody. And I think he was at the same level, Larry Elder was at the same level as the best musicians of his time. I think sometimes in the harmonica world, harmonica players are not so aware of what's going on in the real world, like in the musical world. And some players, some people, they are not so present in the harmonica world, but they are really doing something in the musical world. And for me, that's more important. For example, I have a lot of respect for Gregoire Marais. But you try to judge him by the people he plays with and the kind of situations he's involved in.

SPEAKER_02:

I've had Greg Waugh on the podcast. As you say, he's played with some amazing people, including Herbie Hancock, and it doesn't get much better than that in the jazz world. So absolutely, yeah.

SPEAKER_01:

I mean, that's the highest you can get in music. And I think Larry is something like that, you know, or two steelers. I mean, two steelers, he played with all the best jazz musicians of his era, you know. When you really get into the musical world, I think that's when you can consider yourself, I don't know, a musician. I think it's another level. It's not only about playing the harmonica, no? It's about what can you do in the real world? Do musicians accept you, respect you, or not? I think that's where we should want to go as harmonica players, if we want the harmonica to be a big instrument.

SPEAKER_02:

No, absolutely, and you've done a great job there yourself. So I know you play piano yourself as well, so any other instruments you play, and what's that feeling about the importance of being able to play other instruments as well, maybe particularly chordal ones where you can understand harmony a bit better and...

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, I believe that it's necessary if you play a melodic instrument to play either the piano or the guitar to understand harmony. Not only harmony, but the way the music is spread, where the bass should be, where the melody should be, and what is in between. I always loved the piano, but when I met Larry and I saw that he was a very good piano player, I understood that. That was very important. Then I started listening to Stevie Wonder. I said, okay, this guy also plays the piano amazingly. And then I started listening to Silemens, and I said, okay, this guy plays the guitar amazingly. So, I mean, if you want to be good, it's not only about playing the harmonica, you have to play another instrument, like a harmonic instrument. I also heard Howard Levy, and yeah, I found out that he played the piano also really good. So, I've worked on my piano because I think it's necessary if you want to play very good. If you only know harmony in an abstract way, when you see a C major chord, you're You're going to think on C, E, G. You're going to think on those notes. That's what the theory says, no? Or if you say C major 7, you're going to think on C, E, G, B. You're going to think on that. And you're going to play that because you're thinking on that. But if you play a piano or you play the guitar, then you're going to start understanding how to voice those chords. And you're going to find out that you don't voice it like that. If you want to make it sound pretty, you might voice E, G, A, D, for example. That would be a nice C major sound. And when you start experimenting and knowing those inversions and those different voicings, you're going to start playing those on the harmonica too, and they're going to sound beautiful. When you start playing chords on the guitar or on the piano, you get really deep into music, into understanding what's going on. And you understand that what's happening on the melody is just the top of a big thing that's happening in And it's good to understand what's happening underneath that. How to pass from one chord to another in a smooth way. That's so important. Not to see harmony just in a vertical way, but in a horizontal way. They call it voice leading. That's so, so, so, so useful.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I think a challenge that people have, I think obviously learning another instrument is really valuable, but it's just the time, isn't it? You know, how much time do you spend playing the harmonica and then you've got to go and learn the piano as well. How do you balance that?

SPEAKER_01:

I was lucky that I learned how to play the harmonica very, very fast. Yeah, it's very difficult to have time to do everything. I have problems, too, with this. Not about having time or not, because I think I have enough time. But it's also about managing your time, about practicing efficiently. This is so important. I really know how to practice efficiently on the harmonica. If I have half an hour, I'm going to do the best out of that half an hour. On other instruments, I don't have so much discipline or I don't have so much knowledge of the learning process of the instrument. I don't know. I feel that when I practice the piano, when I practice other things, I waste my time a little bit more than when I practice the harmonica.

SPEAKER_02:

You talk about having an efficient practice routine. I asked this question, if you had 10 minutes to practice, what would you spend that 10 minutes on? So maybe for you, what do you focus on in your 30 minutes practice to be so efficient with your practicing?

SPEAKER_01:

Well, I try to focus on whatever I have to learn for the next gig or for the next concert or the project. I don't really have anything that I practice every day, like an exercise routine. I practice songs or pieces or I work on things that I want to play. Actually, if I only have half an hour, I definitely wouldn't spend it on playing scales and arpeggios and stuff like that. I would try to play some music.

SPEAKER_02:

So we'll move on a bit now to your musical career. Going back to your first album you released in 1991, Antonio Serrano and his Romantic Harmonicas. What about that one?

SPEAKER_01:

I was like 17 years old, more or less. Yeah, I had a manager. I was living in Altea at that time here in this town. And I had a Belgium manager. Well, he was trying to help me, you know. My father was always looking for people to help me in my career, and this was one of them. And he, well, he had some contacts in the Netherlands. He made a record deal with Dureco Studios to make a record. They gave me a lot of options. They sent me like 50 or 60 songs, told me, well, choose 10 or 12 for a record. And they didn't write the arrangements for me. I mean, Dureco Studios is like a very, very big company, and they've been making instrumental records for lots of years, you know, for saxophone players, for trumpet players, guitar players, all kinds of instrumentalists. So they had a lot of arrangements already done and recorded. So that was a record I... It was very easy to record because I didn't have to... I just had to learn the songs and just go there and play with the playback. I don't think I've heard it after I recorded it. I remember I recorded there Send in the Clowns. I mean, the arrangements were beautiful. It's a studio orchestras. I believe some of the arrangements were even made for for some recordings that he did for the Dutch radio. Yeah, but it was a good experience for me. I mean, I think it was my first recording, at least professional recording. I made a record with my father and my brother and sister. We were very young. We played just like Osusana, When the Saints Go Marching In, and this kind of song. But that was like a family recording, you know?

SPEAKER_02:

You recorded with various artists, mainly Spanish artists, yeah? So through the 90s, you did a couple more albums. But Mario Torres is one, and then Joshua Elderman Trio. So you're playing with other people. And then you met up and played with Federico Lechner, and you've done a few albums with him. So you did this continuous session album in 2004 with him.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, as you can see, most of my records, I'm not the leader, let's say, you know? Like, I share the leadership with another musician. Well, to be honest, you know, I was never very ambitious to really make a solo career. I never really thought I was prepared to really be in the front and do something. I didn't really know what I wanted to do either. I liked music and I enjoyed music. I always thought that I was in the process of learning and I still feel that way. I still feel that there's so much to

SPEAKER_02:

learn. This album with Frederico Lechner, some great songs on there. I don't know if it's the first time you recorded it, but you play Sesame Street on there, which is probably a tribute to Tucci, because he played the Sesame Street theme tune on the TV show. So is that the first time you recorded Sesame Street?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, I think

SPEAKER_02:

so, yeah.

UNKNOWN:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

So yeah, that's Sesame Street. Anything particularly about Toots, or is it just a song you'd heard on the TV show and picked it up from there?

SPEAKER_01:

Well, that record, it's all... movie and TV music. We decided the music, the repertoire between piano player and I. I don't remember exactly why we decided to play Sesame Street, but it was a fun song to play. Before the recording, we already did some gigs and we had some concerts. And I remember that people used to enjoy it very much. It was like a high point of the show. So I don't remember if I really related it at that point with two Silemas. I'm not sure about it. I mean, it's a melody that I heard when I was a kid, you know, on the TV. And I knew there was a harmonica there, but I think I didn't know that was too... at that moment. I'm not sure. Actually, I don't know if he wrote the song or not, because I heard Toots say once that he had written that song, but they didn't give him any rights for it, because they said it was educational TV. Actually, the song sounds as if it was a composition by Toots, because if you hear his compositions, they are all kind of bluesy. Yeah, they always move in this boogaloo kind of, except a few waltzes that he has. But if you check his compositions, they have this kind of feel. So I believe that he probably even wrote the song, you know.

SPEAKER_02:

Certainly sounds great on the harmonica, so maybe he did write it. On that album, as you say, it's a movie theme. You do the song Love Theme, which is a beautiful song, and you do this effect with your tongue, which I talked to you about when I met you in London last year. Tremolo.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, that's an effect that I think sounds beautiful on the harmonica. And it's just like moving very fast, the tongue from left to right. It's like a nervous... kind of movement. I never really practiced that. It's just something that comes natural, you know, like people that can move the ears. I don't know. Something natural. But it works. It works very good. I also use it nowadays to play some guitar music, Spanish guitar music. They also use the tremolo technique with the fingers. And it sounds pretty good on the harmonica.

SPEAKER_02:

So a lot of the time you're playing, obviously, with Spanish musicians mainly, are you? Just for people, you know, outside of Spain, maybe not so familiar with that music. You're quite big on the Spanish music scene, yeah?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, I did my career mainly here in Spain. I traveled a lot with Paco de Lucia, but this was touring with him, you know. I never moved anywhere, you know. I didn't move to any other European city or I never moved to the States to try and meet other musicians. I feel comfortable here. I always had fun playing, you know, that They're pretty good musicians in Spain. And I had a good situation here. So I think I always thought that if I moved somewhere else, I kind of had to start from the bottom

SPEAKER_02:

again. No, no, I think you've done the right thing. As you say, you're doing great in Spain. So you have quite a lot of TV appearances in Spain as well, don't you? So are you a reasonable celebrity in Spain? Do people know who you are? Well, I

SPEAKER_01:

suppose the music people, the people that are in music, they all know who I am yeah and then there's a lot of people that know me because I play with Paco de Lucia which he was very very famous yeah I mean I've been playing for so many years that but they don't know my face like I'm not I'm not a celebrity but if you start talking with somebody about music somebody that likes music or whatever eventually they yeah they've heard me somewhere you know or I've made a lot of recordings for pop artists here you know so

SPEAKER_02:

you mentioned Paco de Lucia there so he's a flamenco guitar player the sort of most famous Spanish flamenco guitar player yeah

SPEAKER_01:

yeah yeah He was very, very famous. I mean, he did tours all around the world and he was very respected by all the musicians in the world. He was very, very unique. I mean, because the flamenco world is pretty local, you know. But he was so big, he was so international. He had such a wide, you know, he was so open-minded that he could absorb other styles of music and incorporate them in flamenco. He was very, very, very, very big compared to all the other players of his time, let's say, you know.

SPEAKER_02:

This kind of put you into the realms of playing flamenco and you became somewhat known as a flamenco harmonica player as well. Certainly adding that genre to your playing. What about that, playing flamenco?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, I was very lucky with that, because that's probably, let's say, one of my main contributions to the instrument, to introduce harmonica in the flamenco world. But yeah, it was something natural. I was in the musical scene in Spain, and little by little, the flamenco community, the flamenco musicians, they started calling me to do different things. And I had to learn a little bit more What was that music about? And well, eventually Paco called me and it was like, wow, man, I don't know so much about flamenco to be here. I didn't know so much about flamenco. I said, maybe I don't deserve to be here. I tried not to hang too much with the musicians just in case they figured out that I didn't know anything about flamenco. But little by little, I got into it. It's amazing. It's a real culture. It's a big culture. It's the kind of music that it's like the blues or like Cuban music, you know, that it's very connected to the way the people live. It's not just an intellectual thing. It's not something that you go to school and you learn. It's something that is really part of the gypsy culture. Or not only gypsy, but also, especially in the south of Spain, Andalucía, the people live in a way that music is an important part of the life. Like in Cuba, for example, everybody plays, everybody sings, Yeah, it was very, very, very important for me to meet this culture, not only to learn how to play the music, but also to understand that music has to be part of the everyday life, not just a work or a profession or an intellectual thing or an academic thing. You know, the real music, the important music, the music that really changes the world is music that belongs to a culture that belongs to the people.

SPEAKER_02:

And then in 2012, is it your second solo album, the Harmonious album?

SPEAKER_01:

Which one was the first one?

SPEAKER_02:

Well, you and your

SPEAKER_01:

romantic harmonica. Oh, I don't consider that my album because I didn't really, I mean, I just chose the songs from a bunch of songs they proposed, the album from the company. I think probably Harmonious is my first solo exposure, not like saying, well, this is what I am, right? This is what I have to say. And I'm happy that I eventually could do something like that. And I'm proud of it. I like it. It's one of the few records I made that I can hear without feeling any kind of pain. Because it's very honest. It's all about things that I like. I did it in a way that I wasn't even intending to make a record. I was more trying to build up a show. And the guy that was helping me with the keyboards and with the loop pedals and that, he told me, hey, why don't we record it while you are working on this? Because it sounds great. And maybe now is the moment to record it. And so it really came very naturally. And I was very inspired by the fact that I was trying to build a show in which I didn't need any other musicians. It was a challenge, a big challenge for me. And I feel I succeeded in this challenge and I'm happy with that recording. I think that's what represents pretty well what I am or what I was in that moment.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, there's a good mixture of genres on there as well, isn't there? You've got the Estudios, which is a classical type of solo, some Spanish-themed ones, and then you've got a song I really love, it's Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head.

UNKNOWN:

.

SPEAKER_02:

It's a great mixture on there. You also play some diatonic on there. Is it that one where you play Born Blind?

SPEAKER_01:

And I also play that diatonic on East and West. I do kind of Arabic kind of scales on the diatonic.

SPEAKER_02:

again you know you play different genres we talked about you obviously playing flamenco just now and you've done lots of session work with playing in pop songs in lots of Spanish artists classical you started out on and in 2019 you had the classical album with Constanza so that's just you and a piano player is it

SPEAKER_01:

yeah that's a record I wanted to do many years ago and eventually I did last year it's all classical Spanish classical music and some Argentinian music like I and Carlos Guastavino and some of the music I learned recently but a lot of it I had already played many years ago but I never got the chance to record it so that's another record I enjoy because I really started when I was a kid I started trying to do a classical career let's say and I couldn't make it because it was just so complicated and so difficult to be accepted as a classical musician player on that time, you know, with the harmonica. You had to play original stuff all the time. You couldn't play music written for other instruments. They were very strict on those days. So I had some, you know, I really wanted to come back to classical music because I really enjoy playing classical music and it's very relaxing for me to play classical music. I could just play, you know. I really have a very, very good time playing classical music. I'm working on a very interesting piece right now, orchestral piece, also by Manuel de Falla that I'm going to premiere in November. I think it's going to be interesting, and it's going to be a nice arrangement for harmonica and orchestra. I think a lot of players will want to play in the future. It's a piece by Manuel de Falla, but I think it suits the harmonica perfectly. It's called The Three-Cornered Hat, which is beautiful.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, brilliant. So on that setting as well, I think playing the chromatic on this album with... with Constanza. You know, playing with the piano, there's something about the chromatic with the piano, isn't there? They just go so well.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, I always played with piano. I love it. I think the harmonica works acoustically better with a guitar. The thing is that the piano is like an orchestra. So it's so nice to be able to play with a piano because you can do almost anything you want.

SPEAKER_02:

And in 2020, you did the Tootsology album, which is a tribute to Toots, who sadly died, of course, in 2016. So there's a duet of you playing with Toots and you playing Autumn Leaves together.

SPEAKER_01:

That's also another album that I really enjoy. And it wasn't intended to be an album. I didn't want to make a record of that because I was also trying to build up a show in which I played some of the Toots classics. and tried to cover all his career, you know, from the beginning, from the 40s until the late, well, the 21st century. I mean, his career was so big, so long that I really wanted to make a show where I could show at least the parts of his career that I really liked more. I recorded a few tracks on a studio just for a promotion, just to promote the project. Because when you make a band, when you make a project, you have to have something to show. Otherwise, people don't book you. So we recorded a few tracks on the studio and then we just started playing concerts. It wasn't intended that we were going to record that concert, but we made a concert in the Terraza Jazz Festival in Spain. And they recorded the concert in different tracks, you know, in separate tracks. And they sent it to us and said, hey, listen to this. I think the concert sounds good. So I started listening to it and I said, wow, I mean, this concert really sounds like it could be a record. Maybe if we cut a few things, you know, it would take some... You didn't need to add anything completely. to it. You just had to take a few songs and cut a few things and you could make a record. So I started working on that and then I remembered that I had actually played with Tootsie Lemans on that same festival many years ago. So I talked with the guys on the festival and said, hey, do you think you have this recording? Because I want to make a record, you know, with the material I have of this concert. And it would be amazing to be able to include the collaboration I did with Toots so many years ago. And they found the recording. So, I mean, I'm so, so happy I could include that there.

SPEAKER_00:

It's

SPEAKER_01:

a nice moment. I mean, it's a special moment. I can feel there's a lot of emotion and respect in the recording. So I'm really happy with the result. You

SPEAKER_02:

know, so yeah, so moving on from the albums you recorded, you've done lots of session work. You played with Chaka Khan on I Feel For You, and there's a YouTube clip I'll put on it. You're playing on the stage with Chaka Khan. That wasn't you who played on the original song though, was it? Because that was quite a long time ago now, wasn't it? That was Stevie Wonder. So yeah, lots of different people. So yeah, great career. Any particular favorites of people you played with?

SPEAKER_01:

Well, I had a great time and I think it was one of my deepest musical experiences. Last year, a few years ago, I played with Peter Bernstein. a guitar player, a jazz guitar player from New York, and Michael Cannon, also a jazz pianist. And I had a very, very nice, very good connection with them. So I had a great experience doing this.

SPEAKER_02:

So, yeah, you've done soundtracks with films, and you've been on quite a few of the Spanish films, haven't you, on the soundtracks as well?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. Yeah, I played in Almodovar's Carne Tremula, I think. Yeah, I did with Almodovar and with a few others.

SPEAKER_02:

And you still do teaching now as well, don't you? So are you still actively teaching chromatic?

SPEAKER_01:

Well, I don't teach very much. I have never teached a lot. I had a student, you know, like a year and a half ago, a Chinese guy, you know, he just came to me. He wanted to take some lessons. And he played the guitar. He didn't know how to play harmonica at all. He wanted me to teach him. So I started teaching him and he was very disciplined. You know, he was practicing every day and he was getting good. So I continued teaching him. And then he went back to China. When he came back, he stayed at my place for a few weeks. And eventually he stayed there. I... And then we had the lockdown, and he stayed with me during the lockdown. So he was like my student, but he actually was living with me. It was a very, very interesting experience, because I've never teached for a long time to the same person. And with this person, I had a very, very intense, let's say, teaching experience. And it's been very, very, very interesting, and I really enjoyed it. The thing about teaching is that It requires a lot of energy, a lot of time. I just don't have that time because I like to play. I have to play. I have to... do concerts, I have to travel. I mean, I don't have the time I think you need to really teach properly, you know, because I like to take it really seriously, you know, to really understand what are the needs of the person that you have in front of you. I don't believe that there's a method or a way to teach everybody the same. I think a teacher has to try and understand what the other person is needing and you have to figure out how to explain what the other person needs in a way that he's going to understand it and he's going to assimilate the information you know I think it's difficult to teach properly it requires a lot of attention it's a big responsibility also because people you know when people go for lessons it's like when they go to a psychologist you know they want something desperately they want to learn music it's important for them it's something music is something very passionate it's a big responsibility so I don't want to do it just for money or just for when I do it I want to do it very very seriously let's say

SPEAKER_02:

so are you encouraged to do more teaching now after your experience it's Kang Kang isn't it the guy you were teaching

SPEAKER_00:

yeah

SPEAKER_02:

and maybe you know work's a bit quiet now given the pandemic situation are you thinking about doing more teaching or

SPEAKER_01:

I'd like to I don't know right now I'm really busy you know with this orchestral piece and a few other projects that I have I don't know maybe in the future in the future I just wrote a book actually it's in Spanish it's not in English to learn how to play the chromatic harmonica oh yeah well I express my point of view on the instrument I suggest my way to understand the instrument hopefully it will be in English soon but I don't know when I don't know when

SPEAKER_02:

and this year in August you took part in the online spa convention and then you went on to win the spa harmonica player of the year award during that so how was that for an honor wow

SPEAKER_01:

that was exciting I don't know I don't receive so many prizes. Yeah, I mean, it's especially because it's a prize given by professionals, you know, by harmonica players and I really appreciate it. You know, I feel very, very honored because my attention has always been more into, as I told you before, has been more into the music than into the harmonica. So to feel that the harmonica players appreciate what I do is, well, it's great. I don't try to play for the harmonica players. I try to play for the musicians and sometimes you don't you don't connect with harmonica players because harmonica players want to hear some, you know, specific things. Especially, for example, in Asia. In Asia, there's a big passion for the harmonica, but they are more interesting sometimes in playing fast and playing very difficult things and very spectacular stuff that just to play a nice melody or to be able to just to express yourself, you know, in an honest way on the instrument. Well, to feel the, I don't know, that the harmonica community looks at your work and gives you a like this. I mean, it's great. It feels that we are connecting. I think the harmonica world is looking more and more into the music and the musicians are looking more and more into the harmonica. So that's nice. And the harmonica eventually will become a normal instrument, like the saxophone or the violin.

SPEAKER_02:

No, it's a great honor. It's good to get yourself on that list. So yeah, so obviously you're a chromatic player, so you play a little bit of diatonic, but you're a chromatic of choice. You like the Hohner 270s, yeah? The traditional chromatic from Hohner.

SPEAKER_01:

Yes, actually I got used to that instrument and I've been playing it for more than 25 years. I always say that the best instrument is the one that you know better, if we're talking about good instruments. I think all the chromatic harmonicas that are professional, that we can consider professional instruments, they're all good. All the models are good, but The best for you is the one that you know better. And this is the instrument I know better because I've been playing it for so long. I know what I can do, what I can't do. I know what are the limits. I know how to play it so I don't have to, I don't break the reeds. I know what kind of pressure I have to use to make certain sounds or certain bendings. And I love it. I love it. And also it gives me a lot of confidence to play that instrument. The fact that most of Larry Adler's and two Silliman's records and career were done on that instrument. And those are the guys that that I looked at when I was learning. They were my idols. So it's a tested instrument. It's an instrument that has demonstrated that it's capable of making great music.

SPEAKER_02:

It's great to see, because obviously now there are more expensive chromatics available. And so the 270 is not cheap, but it's on the cheaper end of what you can pay for a chromatic now. But to hear someone like yourself still playing great on that model, it shows, doesn't it? Like you say, the instrument is...

SPEAKER_01:

I don't know, maybe these new instruments in a hundred times we'll know if they if they if they were good or not i don't have so much time to to know you know so i i know that this instrument is capable because the records i like were were recorded on that instrument so that's why i use it so Also, when I was a kid, I had my father that he took care of my instruments and I was kind of trying all the new instruments and everything. But when my father passed away, I didn't have anybody to take care. So I had to decide what to do. I don't know. I started playing this instrument in part also because it was cheap and I could afford it. And I didn't want to learn how to fix instruments because that takes a lot of time and I wanted to spend the time in other things. I think it's a very balanced instrument. The quality is amazing and the price is cheap. So are you playing the

SPEAKER_02:

deluxe model now or the standard model? No, the standard model. And do you have anyone customize them for you now?

SPEAKER_01:

Well, I had recently a Portuguese guy. I sent him a few broken harmonicas and he fixed them. And he did a nice work. He did a nice work on them. He changed the spring tension and he tunes the reeds. He can... He can even change some reeds. He puts screws on the reed plates. He's a professional. He knows how to do it. I'm not very interested in the instrument itself. I have an opinion about the harmonica, and it's that I think the harmonica is one of the closest instruments to the voice, to the human voice. So the less technology and the less material you include in an instrument, the better. Each new material that you put into the instrument, each new device that you put into the instrument you are putting like a filter between the music and your voice so what I like about this instrument is it's just like a it's a piece of wood and it's a piece of metal and that's it and that's a harmonica I mean when you start putting things into it it stops sounding like a harmonica and it starts sounding more like an accordion or like another instrument, like a melodica or something like that. That's what I feel when I hear the new instruments. I hear they don't sound so clear, so bright. They sound more like... It's not so close to the human body, to the voice.

SPEAKER_02:

I believe you mainly play the C chromatic, but you've started looking at playing some of the keys sometimes, the chromatics.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. I'm beginning to...

SPEAKER_02:

to do this. Are you able to switch keys without too much effort, you know, mental effort?

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I can get used to it easily, but I didn't do it before because I was trying to kind of force myself to play in every key and be able to do everything in the C harmonica, but I think it's a little bit silly. It's not a good enough reason to not play other instruments because the register is different. I mean, if you play a G chromatic harmonica, you have more notes on the left, you have more notes on the low register, which might be useful and beautiful to play. And also if you want to play chords, well, you're very limited to the chords that are on the key of the harmonica. So, for example, if you're playing a classical piece in A major and you want to do some double stops and some chords and some stuff, it's better to get a harmonica in A. Why not? It's going to sound better, probably. That doesn't mean that you should be able to play your chromatic harmonica in every key and you should be able to do everything in every key, more or less. But for artistic reasons, I think sometimes it's better to use the harmonica in the key of the piece I'm not prejudiced about that anymore I think it's a good option

SPEAKER_02:

certainly guitar players use different tunings for example so why not on the harmonica and I believe you're a pucker a puckerer

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, mainly. I don't play what they call tongue blocking all the time. I use this technique because I like to have my tongue free to do things to the sound.

SPEAKER_02:

And what about amplification? Are you mainly playing through the PA to get a clean sound or do you use any amplifiers at all?

SPEAKER_01:

No, I don't use any amplifiers that I like particularly. I normally play through the system. And if I'm playing in a situation that I have drums... Piano, bass, I use a 58, a Shure SM58. And through the system, yeah, like two cinemas used to do. That's the most efficient way, I think, to play in a band situation. And when I play with, I don't know, if I play just classical music with a piano player or with an orchestra or something like that, then I like to use other microphones, like condenser microphones. that are more sensitive and you don't hold in your hand they are at a distance

SPEAKER_02:

and what about for recording microphones any particular you like or you just leave that up to the studio guy

SPEAKER_01:

it also depends on what kind of music you're you're recording if it's bob rock you know anything that has a lot of a lot of sound behind i think the best thing is uh is the the 58 on your hand and then you put a little bit of reverb and it sounds beautiful that's the best option if you want to do something more acoustic then you might go for for a newman or sennheiser you know that all this condenser microphones that they pick up not only the sound straight from the reed, but they pick up everything. They pick up all the sound that's around the instrument. Also, what you're doing with the air and picks up everything. Even if you're playing with another musician, with a guitar player or a singer, it's going to pick up that too.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, brilliant. So thank you. So final question now. So just about your future plans, I believe we talked about your Chinese student. You've been doing a project with him called East Meets West. So is that something that you're looking to put out soon? Any other plans coming up?

SPEAKER_01:

Well, we did a concert a few weeks ago in Valencia. And it was nice. We had a great time. We played with Albert Sanz, which is an amazing piano player. And we played some Chinese songs that I arranged for him. And we also played some Brazilian songs. classics that he he really loved like desafinado all these songs classic brazilian songs and he's just returned to china so i don't know when he intends to come back like in february so maybe when he comes back we will continue doing something i mean it was more it's not this project it's not like a band that i'm i'm putting together it's more well a way to to get him to have a a real musical experience, you know? I mean, he's a student, right? And I think one of the most important things to become good as a musician is to play a lot of concerts, to have the experience of playing for the public, playing for the people. That's what makes you strong. So, I mean, he's my student, so I'm trying to help him. And I think he has a lot of talent. Yeah, I think it's good for him to play with me, that I have an experience and I've been playing for so many years. You're a very good teacher, Antonio.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, so that's it then. So that's all we've got time for today, Antonio. Thanks so much for joining me today.

SPEAKER_01:

Well, thank you, Neil. It's been very interesting to talk with you.

SPEAKER_02:

Thanks so much for listening, everybody. It wouldn't be the same without you. And thanks again for my sponsor, the Long Wolf Blues Company, helping me keeping this thing going. They build great purpose-built equipment for the harmonica, so be sure to check them out. Thank you, Antonio. Play us a Rhapsody in Blue.

UNKNOWN:

Thank you.